The General Electric F110-100 engine uses an oil operated nozzle hydraulic pump. The pump, all actuators, and all hydraulic lines are filled with engine lube oil at high pressure. Convergent/divergent nozzles have, in serial flow relationship, a convergent section, a throat, and a divergent section. The exhaust nozzles of such engines use convergent/divergent flaps with associated seals between the flaps to define the flow path of their respective sections. When converted to an axisymmetric nozzle, an actuation system is added to the divergent flaps of the nozzle to deflect the exhaust gas by any amount and in any desired direction from the engine counterline. The flaps and seals aerodynamically control the exhaust flow to transform the pressure and thermal energy of the engine exhaust discharge airflow into velocity and forward thrust for the engine.
Present day hydraulic systems have a pumping supply which is able to meet the needs of the actuation systems. This is accomplished by sizing the supply to be equal to the sum of the needs of each actuation system. Unfortunately, this approach produces a large pump, tanks, and coolers when designed for several high capacity actuation systems.
It is therefore highly desirable and an object of the present invention to provide a means of managing the output of a hydraulic pump to a plurality of actuation systems wherein the size of the pump, tanks, and coolers can be reduced, without sacrificing system performance.
Another object of the present invention is to provide such a means of managing the output of a hydraulic pump to a plurality of actuation systems using priority logic to define which actuators receive flow, and which must receive reduced or no flow to prevent a demand in excess of the pump capacity.
Another object of the present invention is the provision of using this system whenever the total flow requirements of the actuation systems can exceed the capacity of the pump. The present invention, therefore, is particularly adaptable for use with a system having an axisymmetric vectoring exhaust nozzle (AVEN). The priority system for the pump flow can be used to optimally determine hydraulic priority for an AVEN system.
These objects and other features and advantages will become more readily apparent in the following description when taken in conjunction with the appended drawings.